Andrei Sakharov

Andrei Sakharov was a Russian nuclear physicist, dissident, and activist for disarmament, peace and human rights.

He became renowned as the designer of the Soviet Union’s RDS-37, a code name for Soviet development of thermonuclear weapons. Sakharov later became an advocate of civil liberties and civil reforms in the Soviet Union, for which he faced state persecution; these efforts earned him the Nobel Peace Prize in 1975.